


Sanare

by bibliophilic



Series: Artibus [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, For Spoiler Purposes, Minor Character Death, Pairings Not Tagged, Torture, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29328261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bibliophilic/pseuds/bibliophilic
Summary: Death knocked on Sasuke's door at five years old and took his pet fish with them before leaving.  He was so upset that he didn't even want to go to the academy that day.Death visited him again at seven years old, and this time they took his little sister before leaving.  He felt the sting on his heart so he started to harden it and make walls, he didn't think he'd ever seen his brother cry before.Death descended upon him once more when he was eight years old, and they had the audacity to take his entire family and clan with them.  The rest of his soul died there, laid to rest next to his parent's and sister.  His walls were high and strong now, it would take an intense strength to break through them.Erika Uchiha wished Death had visited her on that day the Hidden Leaf Village Embassy blew up.  She was in for a far worse fate now.  Death would have been a kinder companion.  Dying left fewer scars.
Series: Artibus [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2154204
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1.1

Death is a concept that becomes familiar to those in the shinobi world. It robs you of your innocence and makes you so much more aware of the morality of life, how it can be gone in an instant even snuffing out the strongest of lives. Shinobi were surrounded by death and they expected it at every turn, hardening their hearts to protect themselves and get their job done. But Sasuke wasn’t a shinobi, not yet anyway. No one thought death would come so soon to him at seven years old, in broad daylight within the walls of his own village. The explosion shook the whole village or at least that’s how it felt to Sasuke sitting in the academy classroom, being herded outside in an orderly manner only to see the Hidden Leaf Village Embassy going up in smoke and flames was a sight he would not forget. It would be the first of many sights that continue to haunt him. Like the sight of the smoking Leaf Village Embassy and the shinobi setting up tape and trying to keep people away from the area, the explosion had happened hours ago and yet Sasuke could still feel the burning in his nose. He watched bodies wrapped in white cloth being pulled out on stretchers and caught a glimpse of one just before it was covered; a blackened crisp was all that was left of whoever they were. The whole ordeal felt unreal to him, like he was somehow in a dream and his mind was disconnected from his body. He stood there for a long time even though he wasn’t meant to be, watching people weeping, the inured moaning, so many bodies being pulled out from the rubble; some more recognisable than others. Iruka-sensei would be wondering where he was, worried as he had just disappeared. But he needed to find her.

It was a panicked, grief-stricken voice that was familiar to him that broke his dream-like state.

“Sasuke! What are you doing here!?”

He wished he would never have to hear his mother’s voice sound like that again. It sounded so sad and helpless, not how his mother usually sounded. Why did she sound like that anyway? Why did his family look like that all standing there together? They were just there to collect his sister, just like him. But it then slowly dawned on Sasuke, maybe she was hurt like the others? Moaning in pain like those being carried off on stretchers, that thought made him hurt, it was his job to protect his little sister. Sasuke’s mother hurriedly pulled him away from the horrible scene but he was reluctant to leave, they had to go and get his sister why weren’t they looking?

His brother wasn’t saying anything, wasn’t looking anywhere in particular, he just had a blank stare as he robotically walked next to Sasuke back to their home. His father had already walked away from them long ago. Arriving at their home was worse, dark and cold and full of tension that Sasuke didn’t notice. He was angry because no one was saying anything. Itachi disappeared into his room as soon as he crossed over the threshold, he knew that was selfish as his little brother was out there and he didn’t really know what was happening. But he needed a moment to collect himself, to first let tears fall and for his grief to sink in. His father had gone to see if she was among any of the injured, but Itachi knew that any hope of that was so slim it was barely worth having. Little girls didn’t survive explosions very often if at all. He was already mourning his sister, the sister he had promised to always protect along with Sasuke. Itachi balled his fists to try and ground his emotions, but his tears would not cease and his frustration grew. He was praised as a prodigy, graduated at seven years old, entered ANBU at eleven, what was any of that if he couldn’t notice an attack happening in his own village? If he walked his six-year-old sister to her own death that very morning? Itachi had two pure souls in his life, and now he only had one and he would not fail to protect it again. The purple ribbon tied in a bow around Itachi’s wrist was now one of the most precious things to him, he ran his index finger over the sloppy loops and just stood unmoving in the middle of his room, quietly crying.

*

The moment his brother left the room Sasuke knew that something bad was happening, and he felt too scared to say anything. Mikoto could see her son starting to tear up and she fought her own in favour of comforting him, he looked so small and helpless standing there with a wet face and running nose. So with a sniff of her nose, and a wipe of her eyes, Mikoto beckoned her son over to sit down next to her.

“Now Sasuke, I have to tell you something sad.”

“Is it about Eri?” Sasuke asked with large, watery, eyes looking up at his mother in fear. Mikoto breathed in a shaky breath and nodded, there was a part of her that didn’t want to talk about it. Saying it out loud would make it real.

“Yes Sasuke, it is about Erika.” Mikoto took another breath and sniffed before continuing. “You know that your sister was visiting the Embassy on a school trip, but then something happened and there was an explosion.”

Sasuke knew this already, his sister was the only one in their class to want to go on the trip. He didn’t know why? She was training to be a shinobi, why would she need to go see what diplomats did? He could feel the smallest seed of annoyance blossom in him, did his mother think he was stupid and needed things repeated to him?

“Yeah, I already know that.”

Mikoto didn’t say anything for a moment, she needed to brace herself for the next words that would come out. Just thinking about them made her eyes tear up and she squeezed them shut to try and stop the flow. A few leaked out down her cheeks and a sob escaped her before she managed to stifle it with shaky breaths and sniffing. When Mikoto opened her eyes again she found Sasuke just staring at her; worried. Nobody wanted to see their mother cry and Sasuke hadn’t seen it before until this moment.

“Well, Sasuke, we need to be ready for the possibility that your sister has d-died.” Mikoto could barely get the last word out, saying it made the possibility all too real. Her brain kept telling her that there was practically no chance of her daughter surviving, and she needed to face the logical facts. But her heart clung to hope and wept at the thought of her sweet and kind daughter not being around anymore, that agony was too painful to think of.

“Dead?” Sasuke questioned. He’d heard the word used before by people older than him and in some of the books he’d read. His mother and brother looked very sad about it, and he knew that when someone died they went away somewhere and didn’t come back. But where? He didn’t know the answer, but he had a lot of questions.

“Will Eri become a skull?”

“Huh?” Mikoto couldn’t think of a smarter response to the question she was not expecting.

“It’s just, in my books when someone dies they become a skull. Is that what’s going to happen to Eri?” The question was so innocent she almost giggled despite herself, clearly, Sasuke still hadn’t quite grasped the gravity of the concept yet.

“No Sasuke, that’s not quite how it works. She won’t become a skull. Erika will go away, somewhere far away.”

“But she’s going to come back right? I know other people don’t, but Eri’s different, she always finds me. Even when we’re playing hide and seek and I hide in all the hardest places, she always finds me.”

Sasuke looked so hopeful in that moment, and that hope just broke all of Mikoto’s composure. How could she break his naive hope? His unwavering faith in his little sister? They were so close. Sasuke being so happy to take on the big brother role when Itachi was away, and Erika always being some sort of mediator between them all. Mikoto knew Erika loved her brothers more than anything, and that they both loved their little sister in return.

When Fugaku slammed their front door open with a grim look on his face, Mikoto’s dread increased and her hope shattered. He shook his head, and she knew what it meant. Erika Uchiha was not among the survivors, she was not among the injured. Erika Uchiha was dead. He left the room just as quickly as he came, Fugaku was not good at handling grief after just hearing it.

“Not this time, Sasuke.” His hope-filled face fell back to fear, and he physically curled in on himself in defeat.

“Is she..?” When his mother nodded it seemed a dam just broke in his tear ducts, and a flood fell out of his eyes. He leaned into his mother, who also broke at the sight of her son’s defeat.

“She always m-managed to find me…I-Itachi said she had eyes at the back of her head to always see! Why can’t she come back this time!?” Sasuke sniffed and choked on his tears as he spoke, and more just kept coming. Abruptly he stood up from his mother’s side and turned to hurriedly leave the room, but found Itachi in his path. His eyes were red and swollen, they shimmered with possible tears but none fell. Sasuke glared at his brother.

“You told me that Eri had eyes at the back of her head! You’re a liar! Now she’s never coming home!” He ran at his brother who just stood there waiting for the impact, and when it came Sasuke clung to the front of Itachi’s clothes and wept into him.

“You’re a liar..!” All Itachi could do was hold his crying little brother, watch his weeping mother, and let his own tears fall silently and slowly down his face again.

*

Sasuke started to think about all the things he did with his sister.

How they would eat breakfast together in the morning, and how he’d sit beside her after and wait for their mother to french braid her hair before they went to the academy. He never understood why she got their mother to braid it every morning when he knew Erika could do it herself. How they sat next to each other in the academy and worked together to solve any problem, even when they weren’t supposed to. He remembered how excited he was when he found out his little sister had been moved up a class to his own. How when the three of them sparred together she always teamed up with Sasuke against Itachi, she said it was fairer that way. Itachi never minded, in fact, he always agreed with her. They still always lost, but Sasuke liked knowing he always had a partner he could trust to have his back.

How he refused to wear the dark, blue ribbon she gave him because it was too girly for a guy to wear. She settled for him carrying it in his pocket, now he regretted never wearing it like she had asked. He knew Itachi wore his.

Would all of this just disappear? Would he fill in the Erika shaped gaps in his life himself? Did he even want to? Sasuke would quickly realise those Erika shaped gaps in his life wouldn’t fill, he wouldn’t let them. Even when life tried to fill them a little, he felt guilty and stopped it. Those gaps were all he had left now of his little sister.

He now waited five minutes after breakfast every morning before going to the academy, sitting in the exact spot where he used to wait for Erika to have her hair french braided. He put his bag on the space next to him at the academy and didn’t move it for anyone, that spot next to him in class was already filled. When he sparred with Itachi he left gaps in his attacks where another person could come in and back him up, Itachi asked him why he left himself open and when he got the answer, he never asked Sasuke about it again.

He always wore the blue ribbon around his wrist and never took it off, no one ever knew that indifferent Sasuke could become so angry until someone made fun of him wearing it.

Sasuke realised earlier than most of his classmates that death didn’t ask permission. They didn’t let you say goodbye, or I’m sorry, or I love you, they just knocked on your door and started carving chunks out of your life. Taking those pieces away with them along with that precious person’s life.

It would take months for Sasuke to stop sleeping in Erika’s room, for Shisui to stop bringing a sunflower for her when he met Itachi. For Fugaku to stop searching for hope that his only daughter was alive somewhere, for Mikoto to stop setting her place at the table. For Naruto to stop crying in his home at the thought of one of his few friends not coming back, for Itachi to stop falling asleep at her grave.

Death did not care what holes they carved in people’s lives, Death was greedy and unfair. They always took the good people and spared the bad. This, however, was one thing Itachi could understand about Death when they started taking the good people in his life. The living loved and cherished these good people very much. They always brought joy, or inspired strength, or provided wisdom. If the living wanted them, why wouldn’t Death want them too?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> \- Fae x


	2. Chapter 1.2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death knocked on Sasuke's door at five years old and took his pet fish with them before leaving. He was so upset that he didn't even want to go to the academy that day.
> 
> Death visited him again at seven years old, and this time they took his little sister before leaving. He felt the sting on his heart so he started to harden it and make walls, he didn't think he'd ever seen his brother cry before.
> 
> Death descended upon him once more when he was eight years old, and they had the audacity to take his entire family and clan with them. The rest of his soul died there, laid to rest next to his parent's and sister. His walls were high and strong now, it would take an intense strength to break through them.
> 
> Erika Uchiha wished Death had visited her on that day the Hidden Leaf Village Embassy blew up. She was in for a far worse fate now. Death would have been a kinder companion. Dying left fewer scars.

Fear comes easily to six-year-old girls. They become frightened of the dark, and the vast unknown that lay within that darkness. They become frightened of bugs, their skittery appearance and many many legs. They become frightened of heights, the gut dropping fall and the splat! at the bottom. They become frightened when they can’t find their families, calling and calling while nobody answered.

When Erika Uchiha managed to peel open her eyes, she remembered at that moment that this was how she felt when she would wake up after Sasuke and her trained with Itachi. She always did sleep the best after those days, too tired to do much else. But Erika did not remember sparring with her brothers, in fact, the last place she had been was on a school trip and then she became very sleepy all of a sudden.

But the sight before her was not a familiar one, and it made panic shoot through her small body. The ceiling above her was a grubby white and the only light in the room came from fluorescent ones, there were no windows and when she tried to sit up her arms and legs were restrained and she fell back onto the hard surface.

“Mummy?” She tried to call out, but her voice was quiet and rough. Her throat felt dry and all Erika wanted was to drink something, but her mother wasn’t coming when she called. She tried again.

“Mummy?” Her voice was still quiet and nobody responded, Erika then thought of her eldest brother and how he was a really strong shinobi.

“Itachi!” Tears started to well up in the girl’s eyes and she desperately started squirming in her restraints, Erika then felt something dig and rub into her back painfully so she stopped moving again.

“Itachi! Where are you?!”

A click and a whining groan sounded as the door opened, and Erika felt utterly terrified at that moment. A woman wearing a white coat and wiry glasses observed the crying girl, her fingers tapping on the corner of her clipboard as she slowly walked up to the gurney in the middle of the room.

“Good morning Miss Uchiha.” The woman watched the little girl flinch in her binds and try to turn her head to see her. Dark tear-filled eyes meeting her light ones as she stood over her. Erika felt scared looking at the woman, her blue eyes seemed cold behind her glasses and her dark hair was pulled back so tight Erika thought they might rip out of her head.

“Who are you?” A little smirk that could barely be seen came across the woman’s face for a moment, before disappearing to her usual cold expression.

“A researcher, Miss Uchiha. One that is here to make sure that every recruit we compile is…durable.” The woman placed her charts of Erika down on the metal table off to the side, and started wheeling over a large machine with a screen on the front. Erika squirmed in her binds and she felt the sting of her skin rubbing against them, her body was tensed and she was breathing faster than normal. Her whole body was panicking, but all the little girl could do was try and watch what the woman was doing with tear filled eyes.

“Why am I here?” Erika questioned quietly as the woman returned to stand over her. Her cold fingers started to lift up the front of her top causing the girl to squirm around more violently, afraid of what the woman was doing. However, the woman just continued what she was doing, as if Erika wasn’t even worth worrying about. She started to stick dots on Erika’s chest with wires attached that connected to the large machine that had been wheeled over.

“You are here because you have been recruited, we are very lucky that you turned out to be an Uchiha. You should last longer than the rest, or I will make sure that you do, otherwise they wouldn’t call me Doctor Kana." She pressed a button on the machine and the screen lit up, a line appearing and then jumping in rhythm with Erika’s heartbeat. Doctor Kana noted that it was slightly faster than average and that made the undetectable smirk return for another moment. 

"It would be such a waste to lose you.” She left Erika’s side again and wheeled over another machine, slightly smaller than the heart monitor and then retrieved something from a drawer.

“Open wide, Miss Uchiha.” Erika eyed the mouthguard hovering above her face and clamped her mouth shut, this only seemed to amuse Doctor Kana.

“We can leave it out, but you’ll live the rest of your life without a tongue.” Erika gulped and then reluctantly opened her mouth and Doctor Kana slipped the mouthguard in. What was going to happen that she might lose her tongue? Her wrists and ankles were chafing from her shaking, now out of her control, and her back was stinging from whatever was digging into it.

“Electroconvulsive therapy has become very useful when helping to treat symptoms of mental health conditions.” Doctor Kana started to stick two dots on the left side of Erika’s head. Every time the woman came close to her, Erika would flinch and she could hear her stress increase with her heart rate.

“But we have found other uses for it.”

Pressing a button, Doctor Kana watched with sick amusement as the heart monitor spiked high and fast as the little girl convulsed on the gurney while trying to scream.

*

Denial became Sasuke’s shield, his defense against what happened next. Anytime someone said she was dead he would walk away quickly, vehemently denying what they said in his mind. She’s not dead, she’s not dead, she’s not dead and he refused to believe anything else. Nothing made sense to the young boy’s mind anymore, he had felt numb for many months after that dreadful day. School was less exciting, training was a chore, sleeping was agony as the only thing for him to do in that silence was think and that was something Sasuke did not want to be doing. Thinking meant accepting what happened and Sasuke did not want to accept it. He wanted to deny and ignore any part of it ever happening, and the best way to do that was to not think. The state of shock was wearing off, leading to questions that consisted of why’s and how’s and where’s. Unbeknownst to Sasuke he was beginning his healing process, first came denial and then what followed was an emotion befitting of an Uchiha.

Erika was angry with everything. Why was she brought here? Why hadn’t her father or her brother come to find her? Why was Doctor Kana doing these things to her? When two men dressed like nurses brought her back to the dingy room they kept her in, she spent most of the time crying and yelling until someone banged on the door and told her to shut up. It had been months now and anger coursed through her like a fire running under her skin, she threw the books in her room against the grimy wall, watching with satisfaction as one of the heavier books left a dent behind. When they told her to shut up she screamed back at them in defiance, she would hit the thin mattress on the wiry bed until her fists hurt, and when they dragged her into that torture room for more “training” she struggled and fought all the way there. Erika hated the fact that she temporarily lost parts of her memory after the electric shock machine, she hated that her body constantly felt in pain and lethargic from all the torture, and she hated the fact that she was trapped in this room that they didn’t even clean. The six-year-old had more anger in her that should fit into her tiny body, but it was the only way for her to cope with what was suddenly happening to her.

Bargaining with everything was all Itachi had left. He pleaded with anyone that would listen; that he would be a better brother, he would always be more alert of his surroundings, that he would take her place, if only they brought her back. He never said any of this out loud, and to anyone else it would seem that Itachi Uchiha had since recovered from his sister’s death. Only those close to him knew that to be false. He pleaded every day in his head, and the nonsensical grief-stricken part of his brain anticipated for his pleading to be answered by someone - anyone. That he would step outside of his room and find her reading a book, or playing with their father’s shogi pieces while singing a little tune. Reality was a horrible plain, and bargaining provided him with hope even if he knew it was false hope. Apparently, bargaining was a healthy process in the grieving stage, but it did not feel very healthy to Itachi. In fact, he felt like he was wallowing, drowning in his sister’s death. Itachi did not think life could get worse than this.

No one would be coming for her, no one would be saving her. A year had passed and anyone that would look for her was dead. Murdered by her own brother Itachi. Except for Sasuke of course, but he wasn’t any older than she was. Erika screamed and cried at the orderly that told her, she so badly wanted to rip that smirk off him and when he shut the door in her face she pounded on it until her hands went numb. How could they all be dead? Her family couldn’t all be dead they were lying! After a while, she stopped, and she paused at the pain in her eyes that resonated from within her skull. She knew what it meant and she waited just in front of the door for her turn. When the orderlies opened the door to Erika’s room, they were met with crimson eyes and a blur as the girl ran at them. They were lucky she did not know how to wield her Sharingan. When they dragged the kicking and screaming girl to the torture room and strapped her down to the gurney, Doctor Kana observed the Sharingan with a smile while stroking the girl’s cheek. Tying a sealing blindfold over them right after. She stated Erika needed to be punished for her attack on the orderlies, but it would help with her “training” in the end. Doctor Kana squeezed the pump of the syringe in her hand and watched cold water bubble out the tip, she then walked over to the blindfolded Erika and started to spread her legs. Erika was starting to understand how hopeless her situation truly was. They didn’t remove the sealing blindfold when they returned her to her room.

His mother was dead, his father was dead, his sister was dead. Everyone was dead. What more was there to say? What more was there to do? His mind was only filled with thoughts of Itachi and what he had done, what he had taken from him. Sasuke was used to death. His sister had died only a year ago, his clan had died last night. It was something that a shinobi often experienced and Sasuke was going to become a strong shinobi, he might as well accept this feeling. This emptiness in his chest, this hole in his gut, the harshness on his face. This was his reality, the death of everyone he ever cared about. He needed to make this right, he needed to fix this, he needed to avenge them. His path was set, his obstacles falling into place. He walked with the death of hundreds weighing on his shoulders, and three weighing on his heart. Shadows formed around him as he accepted what his life had become. There would only be death on his journey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> \- Fae x


	3. Chapter 1.3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death knocked on Sasuke's door at five years old and took his pet fish with them before leaving. He was so upset that he didn't even want to go to the academy that day.
> 
> Death visited him again at seven years old, and this time they took his little sister before leaving. He felt the sting on his heart so he started to harden it and make walls, he didn't think he'd ever seen his brother cry before.
> 
> Death descended upon him once more when he was eight years old, and they had the audacity to take his entire family and clan with them. The rest of his soul died there, laid to rest next to his parent's and sister. His walls were high and strong now, it would take an intense strength to break through them.
> 
> Erika Uchiha wished Death had visited her on that day the Hidden Leaf Village Embassy blew up. She was in for a far worse fate now. Death would have been a kinder companion. Dying left fewer scars.

Erika stared at the paper in front of her, dark eyes running across words as quickly as the seven-year-old could. She could feel sweat form all over her body and she clenched the pencil in her hand tightly, writing her answers down quickly once she figured them out. The girl was conscious of Doctor Kana standing behind her with a timer, watching her. Erika’s body was shaking in fear as she worked, her young brain going into overdrive as it desperately tried to work out the word problems in front of her to avoid her punishment. She needed to be fast at reading the next problem in her head. In a test students had to write a 2 page essay of 450 words each on shinobi principles, 24 students partici-

“You’re too slow Miss Uchiha, times up.” Erika screamed loudly as the scalding hot rod pressed against the back of her arm, right on top of a fresh burn wound in the same place. Not ten minutes ago she had received that first wound, punishment for stabbing Doctor Kana in the arm with the pencil she was given to do these exercises with. Erika had also tried to activate her newly awakened Sharingan but found she couldn’t do it, rendering her forty-third escape attempt another failure. Months ago she had already acknowledged that nobody was going to come and save her, nobody would be able to find her, any person that would even try was probably dead or thought she was dead. Erika’s only hope was that she had to save herself.

“Tut, tut, Miss Uchiha, you need to do better than this. We need your mind to be as exceptionally strong as what your body will become. You are smarter than almost everyone else your age in this training facility, but we must make you even smarter than you already are.” The orderlies then dragged a kicking and screaming Erika back to her unkept room, the smell of her own bodily waste being her greeting to it as the blindfolded girl was shoved back inside. Leaving her open wounds to fester for a few days in pain before coming back to treat them.

The next time they brought Erika in for her intelligence tests, they sat her in front of a large screen on the wall that was covered in small shapes inside squares. There was a long identical screen lying horizontally in front of her with squares that mirrored those on the wall but with no shapes inside. The shapes on the large screen were so small that Erika’s lethargic brain needed her eyes to squint to process them properly.

“Use the pad in front of you to tap the shapes that match.” Doctor Kana instructed with a timer in one hand and the threat of a long needle in the other. Erika did so as quick as she could, eyes and fingers moving almost faster than her brain could keep up with in fear of possible impending pain. When she was again met with the dreaded “you’re too slow Miss Uchiha”, the training compound was joined with another piercing scream as the needle was stabbed into the nerve in the juncture of Erika’s neck; paralyzing her. There was no kicking and screaming that time when the orderlies returned her to her room.

Again they dragged Erika’s achy body to the torture room, physical torture they called “training” taking its toll for the day. Doctor Kana sat her in a chair and handed her a book: The Shinobi and the Hound before sitting in a chair opposite her and telling Erika to read. Erika started, and when she paused at a word Doctor Kana threw a senbon at her, when she stumbled over a sentence Doctor Kana threw a senbon at her, and when she mispronounced something Doctor Kana threw a senbon at her. By the time Erika had finished the book there were senbon sticking out from all over her body, blood trickling out the wounds and body shaking from the burning pain. And once more all Erika got was a “tut, tut Miss Uchiha you need to do better than this,” and then she was thrown blindfolded back into her room and left to try and pull the senbon out.

Every intelligence test strengthened Erika’s mind but weakened her willpower. Every session of physical torture extended her tolerance for pain little by little, but sapped her body’s strength. She was now at her seventy-eighth escape attempt and Erika was once more a failure, lying blindfolded in a puddle of her own vomit in her room as her punishment for trying to escape again was wearing out of her system. The only thing to be heard while she was lying there on the floor were the screams of the other people being “trained” in this facility. Every time she failed Erika felt hopeless and angry, why wasn’t she as strong as her brothers and her father? Why couldn’t she find a way to escape? If her Uchiha bloodline was as talented as Doctor Kana claimed then why couldn’t she? If she was as smart as Doctor Kana claimed then why couldn’t she? Erika Uchiha’s only hope for escaping this hell place was Erika Uchiha, and she knew that if there was any chance of her going home then she needed to keep trying to find a way out. To never give up on her hope of freedom.

Tap

Erika tried to slowly move her head around, she could feel the vomit in her hair as she moved but the drugs in her made Erika too woozy to concentrate on more than one thing.

Tap

No, that wasn’t the drugs…she didn’t think. Erika was sure that the tapping noise was not in her head.

Thump

The noise was much louder now and definitely not in Erika’s head. The girl rolled to her side and slowly tried to sit up, her hand occasionally slipping on the liquid around her. The wall opposite Erika’s bed was cracking in a small spot near the bottom, the thumping noise happening in time with that spot on the wall slowly breaking apart. With a final thump that part of the wall broke open and Erika froze, she definitely heard something breaking and tried to hear what would happen next after sobering up quickly.

“Hello?” Someone said quietly, it was a girl’s voice and she sounded older. Not adult old but older than herself. Erika started to crawl until she hit the wall with her shoulder, she then used her hand to crawl along it.

“Is someone there?” The voice asked again.

“Yes.” Erika said quickly, not wanting the voice to disappear after having a year of no one but Doctor Kana and the orderlies to talk to.

“Oh good, I thought I heard someone going into this room.” Once Erika felt the hole at the bottom of the wall she stopped and lent against it.

“I only thought about breaking the wall now, I was always worried that one of those orderly guys might hear.”

“You don’t think they could have heard now?” Erika questioned.

“Maybe, but right now I don’t really care.” This shocked Erika, she hated those orderlies and if she never met them again it would be too soon. She never wanted to bring them here before they had to come.

“I kept hearing you stumbling around in here, are you ok? Wait that’s a stupid question, you’re here. I mean, they haven’t crippled you or anything to have you stumbling around like that?” Erika smiled a little, the facial expression that used to be so familiar to her was now a foreign feeling on her face.

“No they haven’t crippled me, just covered my eyes.”

“Oh, that’s odd. Why do you need to be blindfolded, you that troublemaker that keeps trying to escape?” Erika hesitated in telling this stranger about her Sharingan, at least while she was still considered a stranger. Erika remembered her father saying how she didn’t need to tell people everything about her, how you only needed to tell them what you were willing to let them tell others.

“Yeah, that’s me.” Erika heard a little chuckle come from the other side of the wall.

“Good, we could use more like you in here.” There was a shuffling sound and then a thud, the girl on the other side of the wall leaning against it comfortably.

“I’m Etsuko, what’s your name?” Erika also got comfortable against the wall.

“Erika.”

“That’s a nice name. How old are you Erika, you sound young.”

“Doctor Kana told me I’m seven.” There was a pause and Erika thought she could hear some angry muttering from Etsuko.

“Well, that psycho bitch doesn’t exactly have any reason to lie about your age. She’s probably right.” Erika felt a little giggle bubble up at the naughty word Etsuko said. She remembered when she asked her mother what that word meant after hearing a lady in the village say it, her mother told her never to use it because it was a naughty word. That just made the word funnier to Erika.

“You’re so young…” Etsuko trailed off.

“How old are you?” Erika questioned.

“I’m fifteen.”

“Wow, that’s old!” Etsuko chuckled in response.

“I’m not that old!”

“Seven years old huh?” Etsuko said again. “I bet you miss your mum.” Erika didn’t say anything for a moment, thinking about her family, her dead family. Even if one of her escape attempts worked she would never see her parents again. She had Sasuke but her mum and dad were dead.

“Do you miss your mum?” Erika quietly asked, feeling tears brim her eyes as she thought about her family.

“Yeah, I do. I’ve been in here a long time and I miss them every day.”

“How long have you been in here?”

“Hmm.” Etsuko looked over at the marks she had made on the opposite wall. “Five years, give or take.” Erika inhaled sharply.

“F-Five years?” Erika muttered, five years? What if she was here for five years? Would she be able to survive that long?

“This place has all the best ways to make a person go crazy.” Etsuko spoke, her voice traveling through the hole in the wall. Erika just furrowed her eyebrows.

“You don’t sound crazy?” Etsuko just chuckled.

“Thanks, I’m glad to hear it.”

The two girls talked quietly through the hole in the wall for some time. Erika learned that Etsuko was from the Hidden Sand Village and her family owned a tea shop, she was kidnapped when she was ten years old while walking home from school. Her favourite food was ramen and she liked daisies (even though they didn’t grow in her village).

“Erika.”

“Yes?”

“Let me give you a piece of advice.” Erika paused and waited for Etsuko to continue. “You’ve already been here for a year, so this torture has probably already affected you whether you know it or not. My advice to make it bearable, do something that’s familiar to you. That brings you a sense of nostalgia or happiness.” Something familiar to make it bearable? Erika wasn’t sure she had something she could do.

“The last thing you want is to lose yourself, that’s exactly what these psychos want. To control you, to mold you into what they want. Don’t let them.”

“Is that what you do?” Erika asked.

“Yeah, I make origami out of the pages of the books I’ve already read because I used to do it with my dad.” Etsuko trailed off again. “We always did it together in the back of the shop.” She said quietly to herself, a sad smile on her face.

“Thanks, Etsuko.” Erika said while using the wall to slowly stand up.

“Don’t forget to cover this hole with something, we don’t want them to find it so we can talk again.” Erika felt around with her hands until she found her side table and then dragged it over to the wall, using her hands again to check that the hole was completely covered. She moved back to her bed and sat cross-legged on the thin mattress. Something that was familiar to her? What should she do? Erika sat and thought while running her fingers through her hair to try and get the vomit out, wiping her hand on her pant legs when she finished. Coincidentally that’s when her answer came to her.

Running her fingers back through her hair, Erika placed her fingers at the top of her head and started to braid. She closed her eyes under her blindfold and imagined it was her mother’s fingers in her hair, that she was back at the table at home getting her hair done before the academy. When Erika got to the bottom of her braid, she undid it and started again. Doing this routine over and over until her mind and body both started to relax a little. Something that was familiar to her that brought her both a feeling of nostalgia and happiness.

The last thing Erika would let them take is herself.


	4. Chapter 1.4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death knocked on Sasuke's door at five years old and took his pet fish with them before leaving. He was so upset that he didn't even want to go to the academy that day.
> 
> Death visited him again at seven years old, and this time they took his little sister before leaving. He felt the sting on his heart so he started to harden it and make walls, he didn't think he'd ever seen his brother cry before.
> 
> Death descended upon him once more when he was eight years old, and they had the audacity to take his entire family and clan with them. The rest of his soul died there, laid to rest next to his parent's and sister. His walls were high and strong now, it would take an intense strength to break through them.
> 
> Erika Uchiha wished Death had visited her on that day the Hidden Leaf Village Embassy blew up. She was in for a far worse fate now. Death would have been a kinder companion. Dying left fewer scars.

"Erika." A voice whispered, the girl in question halted her fingers in her hair when she thought she heard something. Erika furrowed her eyebrows behind the blindfold and stopped breathing for a moment to see if she had really heard something. When nothing else was heard she went back to breathing normally and braiding her hair, humming quietly to herself as her mind went back to her family and friends in the Leaf Village. Erika wondered how much it would have changed, maybe it hadn't changed at all. The only piece of news she had received since being here was two years ago when the death of her clan was used to taunt and bait her, now there was no news. Erika hoped that was a sign that nothing bad had happened to them.

"Erika move your dang side table!" Etsuko spoke again, this time much louder so that Erika could definitely hear her this time. The nine year old dropped her braid over her shoulder and used her hands to guide herself to the side table where the hole in the wall was. Once she had slid it away just enough so that they could talk, Erika sat down on the cold ground with her shoulder leaning against the wall.

"I'm here."

"Good, you doing better today? Seems so if that humming is anything to go by." Erika smiled a little again, glad that the facial expression would not be lost now that she had found Etsuko. Even at nine years old Erika knew that if Etsuko hadn't taken the risk to make the hole and talk to her when she did, she would have wasted away into nothing in this prison.

"Yeah, they just did the yearly clean of my room today. It doesn't smell bad in here anymore and there's no poop or vomit to step in!" Etsuko smiled at Erika's clear happiness about her clean room but it was a sad one. What had their lives become if a clean room with no bodily waste or foul odour in it was a luxury to become this excited about?

"Oh that's right, they just did mine too." Etsuko picked her voice back up to a happy tone as she spoke to Erika.

"Who would have thought that the smell and sight of cleaning products would become the highlight of my life." Etsuko muttered this to herself, but saying it out loud only made her feel angry. She chastised herself in her head for using the word "life," because this wasn't a life.

"Are you ok, Etsuko? You sound annoyed." Years of wearing a sealing blindfold had forced Erika's hearing to become sharper, and she had found it very useful when trying to hear when the orderlies would come for her. She could then mentally prepare herself for what would be happening to her, although that didn't stop the fear from creeping up her throat every time she heard those footsteps or a chilling scream from another captive.

"I am annoyed, at this place. It's obvious no one can find us because they've been doing this torture for years, so we're just going to have to escape ourselves." Erika's eyes widened, she had already come to that same conclusion but all her escape attempts just ended up in failure and punishment, but if there was two of them maybe they had a better chance?

"You have a plan?" Erika questioned, she must have a plan she was Erika's only hope.

"Kinda, sorta...But I know this much, it will take a lot of time, a year at least maybe more. I need to get more people involved and you need to build up these psychos comfort levels with you again, make them think they have control of you again because we could use those Sharingan eyes of yours." Erika's heart sunk but it made sense, she just thought this escape plan would be immediate. She wanted to get out of here and she didn't want to endure or play nice with Doctor Kana. But at the same time Erika also wanted to see again. Although she had adjusted to life with a blindfold her sight was her biggest asset and greatest comfort, Erika was sure she would need it for this future escape plan. She didn't want to run around this place blind when the time came.

"Should I assume that you're in?" A smirk came across Erika's face.

"Yeah I'm in."

Thus the plan had begun. While Etsuko was busy making holes in many places on her walls, Erika was playing nice. She pretended that they had won, that her spirit was sapped, that she no longer had the will or intention to fight them. She endured the physical torture and did everything that Doctor Kana said, and at the end of it all Erika would walk calmly and compliantly back to her room. No kicking, no screaming, no fighting. Erika could see that it was pleasing Doctor Kana in some sick dominant way, and while it made her stomach turn to submit she knew it was necessary. Lull them into a false sense of comfort so it would be easier to surprise them later.

So that is what she continued to do when they came for her again, in fact when the orderlies opened her door again she quietly walked to meet them so they could take her to see Doctor Kana. Erika was sat in a chair in front of the Doctor, her dark eyes uncovered and staring blankly ahead. Doctor Kana smirked and made a hand sign and the room seemed to swirl around Erika for a moment, but she could see that nothing was actually moving. Doctor Kana's voice broke through to her brain.

"Escape the genjutsu, Miss Uchiha." And Erika tried, she really did. She had not yet learned how to release a genjutsu at the academy before she was taken, neither did she know how to wield her Sharingan. Erika didn't want to either, otherwise, all this planning would have been for nothing. So she suffered every terrible image, every painful sensation, every gruesome thought, until Doctor Kana released her herself. A disappointed look on her face.

Erika suffered the same thing for days, Doctor Kana putting her into different genjutsu's and told her to release them. Every day Erika failed and suffered, but she learned. Eventually, she learned enough from the experience that she could release the genjutsu herself. It was either learn or suffer. Adapt or perish under the strain. When they brought Erika back to her room they left her eyes uncovered and she almost wanted to laugh. It was all working to plan, and her newly regained sight felt surreal to her after having it obstructed for so long. But it did not come without a downside.

The state of her room was something Erika wished she didn't have to see, disgusting seemed to be the only word that came to her mind. It still had that same familiar smell of feces, urine, and vomit all mixed together, but now she actually had to see it around her. Had she really been living amongst this? Erika now wondered if the removal of her sight made it easier for her to live in here, now looking at it just made her want to vomit more.

She walked over to her small shelf with books in it and went to reach for one, when she caught sight of her arms. Erika had felt them. Felt her arms, felt her torso, felt her legs, ran her fingers over the bumps and roughness of her skin. But seeing the scars, the burns, the cuts, the bruises that littered all over her like she was some deranged artistic medium, was something else entirely. She did not recognise her own body. They'd taken even that from her.

Erika returned her focus to the books and pulled out one she no longer read. She used it to scrape all the fecal matter and other various bodily fluids to one corner of the room as best she could, and then left the book against the wall. The whole experience made her also wish they covered her nose, the smell pressing up and into her nostrils. But at least now if she turned her back she didn't have to see most of it. Erika had to wait for the rest of the year before they cleaned her room out again.

Moving over to her bed she sat down cross-legged on her mattress facing away from the pile she had just made, her eyes roamed over the walls and the books she now could read and the side table conveniently covering the hole in the wall that she knew was behind it. A little foreign smile quirked at her lips as she thought about her sight, how often she had taken it for granted and how she was now overjoyed that she had regained the sense again. Ironic how her clan's most valued sense was their sight and only now when her clan was all gone did she truly see its worth.

Lifting her hands to her head like she had done every day for the past two years, Erika started methodically braiding again. She could see that her dark hair was oily and knotted but she did her best to slowly try and detangle them again with her fingers, there was not much else to do in here and Erika wanted those books to last for as long as they could. She made sure to breathe slowly and quietly so that she could hear if someone was coming for her underneath all the screaming, flinching at every noise she heard and hoping it wasn't because they were heading for her room.

Erika's only reprieve in this cruel, cruel, place was when everyone just left her alone. And it saddened her that this was, in fact, the case and her only way of being in control until she was going to escape. The one time it would be successful after the hundreds of times she had failed.

*

Reading was one of Erika's favourite past times. Sometimes she had read so much that her mother actually told her to stop reading or she would eventually strain her eyes, but that hadn't stopped the young Erika. She read in class under her desk (caught by an annoyed Iruka-sensei a few times), she read at lunch when her friends and brother were away and Shikamaru was the only person to sit with. But he just liked looking at the clouds and chatting lazily (she enjoyed it more than she wanted to admit to him or anyone), she read at night under the covers with a torch when she just wanted to finish one more page before sleeping. Sometimes she read next to her father while he himself was reading important scrolls, and on an occasion where she asked him how to sound out a word, he would help her read the sentence which eventually turned into the whole book if she was lucky enough to catch him in a good mood. Even now in the only space that was hers in this torture lab, the ten-year-old was reading on her bed. Her back against the wall and the book resting open on her bent legs, her hair loosely french braided and hanging over her shoulder. For once Erika was calm, and while her ears were always straining for noise her brain was focused on the words in front of her, her eye's lazily running across the page before her finger gently turned it over.

But then there was a loud bang and Erika's eyes lifted to the wall opposite her, the wall dividing her room from Etsuko's. She could hear heavy footsteps of many people and some voices that sounded very angry, when Erika heard a distressed noise that sounded like Etsuko's voice she quickly jumped up and ran over to the side table to push it away, her book lying forgotten on the floor.

"Etsuko?" Erika called while pushing the table away, and when she looked through the hole all she could see were lots of pairs of feet and arms splayed out on the floor.

"Did you really think we wouldn't find out about your escape plan Miss Kurosawa?" Erika knew that voice anywhere and it always made her body shiver involuntarily.

"Doctor Kana, please..." Etsuko replied and Erika could hear that she was choking and crying.

"You should not have put your faith in Erika Uchiha." Erika's blood ran very cold and she froze. Why? She hadn't said anything! But then it slowly dawned on the girl, like a horrifying memory that her brain couldn't quite grasp until this very moment when it was much too late. 

The genjutsu training last year. It was the perfect opportunity for Doctor Kana to get Erika to say anything she wanted without Erika ever knowing she had said it.

Then there was a scream and a squelching noise, it was Etsuko's scream.

"Etsuko! Please stop!" Erika yelled frantically and she started hitting the wall as she continued to yell, nobody replied to her or even acknowledged her presence there. When she peered through the hole she could see Etsuko's arms jerking around. The squelching and screaming continued for what felt like hours with Erika crying and yelling Etsuko's name until her throat was hoarse. She watched everything happening through the hole as blood splattered in intervals and then finally pooled around Etsuko's outstretched arms that had now suddenly gone completely still. Erika could not stop crying, she sobbed loudly to the point where she was sick and pain pounded through her skull.

She heard every squelch of whatever they were doing to slowly kill her, every scream of Etsuko's pain, watched as her arms jerked and fought as they were slowly becoming covered in blood. Erika heard every minute of her friend's slow and painful death, and she knew it was all her fault.

She watched through blurry, tearful eyes as Etsuko's limp arms slowly dragged across the floor out of her sight as her room was left empty, the only thing left of Etsuko was the large puddle of her blood on the floor.

Erika rolled over until her back hit the wall and she sat there for a long minute, another sob choked out and she covered her mouth to try and stifle the loud noises she was making. None of it felt real, it was impossible for something so irreversible to be happening to her! Yet she had just witnessed it happen with her own eyes, sights and sounds Erika could never hope to get out of her brain for as long as she lived. When she finally pulled her hand with a shaky breath, there was a small spattering of red on it.

Erika lightly touched her fingertips to the skin underneath her eye and when she pulled away there was blood on them as well. Turning her head towards the side table, she could see a blurry reflection of herself, and her reflection did not have dark eyes. Frantically crawling closer she pushed her face right up to the surface, hoping that maybe getting closer would show that she was mistaken. But only two very red pinwheeled eyes stared back at her, blood slowly dripping out of them down her face. Erika for a moment thought that maybe this was her chance of escape, to finally overpower them. But then she remembered the blindfold and what she had done to Etsuko, and she willed her Mangekyo Sharingan to disappear. It slowly faded to her regular three tomoe Sharingan and then back to her dark eyes. Erika furiously used her top to wipe the blood off her face and hand while also sniffing to try and stop crying. She only had enough time to quickly stand up and turn when her door swung open and banged against the wall. A large man that she had never seen before walked in with a mean face trained on her.

"What are you-" Erika couldn't finish before the man grabbed her shoulders and pushed her harshly out of the way until her back hit the opposite wall, her head snapped back and smashed hard against the surface and she crumbled to the ground. Head spinning as she lay there for a time and then Erika vaguely felt herself being lifted up by her arms, when she slowly peeled her eyes open she was met with Doctor Kana's face. There were other men and women in the room as well and they were all holding toolboxes while standing in front of the hole in the wall.

"Miss Uchiha, you have disappointed me. Damaging property," Doctor Kana gestured to the hole in the wall. "Joining forces with those who instigate escape, I thought you were smarter than this."

The orderlies started to walk her out of her room behind Doctor Kana, and out of the corner of her eye, she could see a woman walking into her room behind her with a large ladder in one hand and a chainsaw in the other.

"You do not need to worry Miss Uchiha, that wall will be fixed and reinforced so we won't have any pesky incidents like this again." Pesky. That's all Etsuko was to these...to these psychos. A pesky little incident.

"But you must be punished for your foolish alliance with your neighbour first, however, you must agree Miss Uchiha..." A twisted little smile came across Doctor Kana's face as she turned back to the girl who was being dragged along behind her, she dropped her voice. "Murderers must be punished."

Erika felt like she was going to throw up when she heard the word. And then she did. Straight out in front of her onto the floor and down her front. It was mostly bile, there was never much food in her stomach now anyway. Doctor Kana scrunched her nose up in disgust and swerved away slightly at the sight, the orderlies paused in annoyance but then just walked her straight through the puddle and on towards the torture room. The liquid smeared all over the legs of her pants, adding to her rancid smell.

Erika's mind would not stop replaying Etsuko's death, every sound, every sight, every smell. That's good. Erika thought to herself as she was strapped down onto the gurney.

Murderers deserved to be punished.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> \- Fae x


End file.
